Zhoushan

“ Shanghai and earn their living amidst more civilized surroundings. One of the strongest arguments in favour of the International Settlement is that it affords safety and protection to the Chinese. They flock to it in great numbers, preferring the just and beneficent administration of the white man to the uncertainties of native rule. So Kwong and his son made their way down the Yangtzse, floating down river on a stately junk with ragged matting sails. ”

“ Today, Zhuo is deceiving the Son of Heaven and bullying the people. His evil deeds could fill volumes, and he is reviled by men and gods alike. You must deliver an imperial edict to Fort Mei, instructing Zhuo to make an appearance at court. When he does, my hidden troops will kill him. This will be a major help to the house of Han, and we shall be regarded as loyal ministers; what do you think?" Su said, "I have wanted to get rid of that old scoundrel for quite some time, and was aggravated that I could not find anyone of like mind. ”

“ But this is the sole highway to Szechuan; all the trade of China's largest province, the one best endowed by nature, must pass up and down here. Any people less prodigal of their strength, less determined and less resourceful than the Chinese, would have given up the struggle before it was begun, and Szechuan would have slumbered undeveloped and forgotten, instead of being as it is now the richest and most advanced part of the empire. ”

“ Thus there has gradually grown up around and upon the concessions a large Chinese city, believed by many to contain almost as large a population as the city within the walls. This is not incredible when we consider that the excesses of the Tae-Pings in Soo-Chow, a large city about thirty miles from Shanghai, have driven vast numbers of its inhabitants to the latter place, which, being already densely crowded, has overflowed its walls, and, as the presence of Europeans has made Shanghai, as it were, a city of refuge for the exiles, they have naturally crowded around the foreign settlement. ”

“ Xuande exclaimed, "The heavens have blessed us!" The three men went out of the compound to receive the visitors. As it turns out, the two visitors were big-time merchants from Zhongshan: one of them named Zhang Shiping, and one of them named Su Shuang. Each year, they traveled north to sell horses, but had to turn back this time because of the bandit rebels. Xuande invited the two of them to come in, and arranged a full banquet in their honor. He then proceeded to explain how he planned to fight the bandit rebels and pacify the citizenry. ”

“ THE CHIEF OF THE CUSTOM-HOUSE GIVES A LESSON IN OPIUM SMOKING. Urumtsi, or Hun-miao (red temple) of the Chinese, still retains its ancient prestige in being the seat of government for the viceroyalty of Sin-tsiang, which includes all that portion of western China lying without the limit of Mongolia and Tibet. Thanks to its happy position, it has always rapidly recovered after every fresh disaster. It now does considerable trade with Russia through the town of Chuguchak, and with China through the great gap which here occurs in the Tian Shan range. ”

“ The empire of Ssu-chuan dissolved, but the Seuen-H'sin grew greater. Its high priest attained the most terrible and far-reaching power in China. But in the second century B.C., Shi- Hwang-ti the great military emperor made war upon the sorcerers and drove them across the Kuen-lum mountains. Still they retained great wealth and power; and in Wu-yang they made a city that is the dream spot of the world, equipped with splendid colleges for the study of astronomy and the sciences and magic. ”

“ Up in Shanghai the whites admired and envied; and: “better far to be ruled by one lion who cannot steal much, than by a thousand and three rats—who can steal a great deal,” said the Yarkand burgesses to the emissaries of the “Central Chinese Committee for Liberty, Union, and Progress.”
When finally, after the Dowager Empress’ death, China overthrew the Manchu throne and established the republic, the general turmoil was hardly felt in this far-away western backwater of Turkestan. ”

“ Tientsin, then, like Shanghai, is a potent, an electric, force in its influence on China. Whatever the Chinese are to become in their struggle towards the light of day will be in some measure due to the example set by these two cities, the only samples of Western civilization which the Chinaman can scrutinize at close range. The missionary tells him of the God of the Western peoples, and of how His Spirit regenerates humankind; the Chinaman listens stolidly, and then turns to look at the samples of regenerated peoples that fringe his Coast. ”

“ Foreign merchants, travelling salesmen, engineers, and insurance agents travel up and down the great river, up and down the coast; they penetrate, by steamer, railroad, mule-litter, or cart, into the interior cities of the great provinces, leaving everywhere on plastic minds distinct and ineffaceable impressions of their manners, business methods, and morals.
In the foreign settlement of Shanghai, and apart from the population of the native city which adjoins it, there are, roughly, 450,000 Chinese who have chosen to dwell in the territory and under the laws of the white men. ”

“ When that time arrives, the Chinese will find the elements of all they are in search of at the foreign settlements in Shanghai, where the schools, the splendid commerce, the merchant palaces, the fleets of steamers, the local foreign government, the opulence of the inhabitants, and the condition of the streets and dwellings, offer an instructive contrast to the condition of the Chinese walled city which lies to the south of the foreign settlements. The labour of centuries has brought this city to its present state, and the result is little to the credit of the authorities who rule there. ”

“ Xu Chu said, "Give me 50,000 crack troops, and I'll bring back the heads of both Liu Bei and Lü Bu as a gift to Your Excellency." Xun Yu said, "Your Excellency, General Xun is brave, but is not thinking strategically. We've only recently established our capital at Xu. We shouldn't prematurely cause a ruckus by using the military. I have a plan that I call 'two tigers fight each other over food.' Right now, Liu Bei is in charge of Xuzhou and is awaiting instructions from the emperor. You could petition the emperor to officially appoint Bei as the governor of Xuzhou. ”

“ Life is in a whirl at Shanghai. The river bund is crowded, and so is the long, winding Bubbling Well Road. The concessions are splendidly managed from a foreign point of view, and vie with each other in public spirit. The Chinese, however, feel greater warmth for Hongkong, which gives them representation on the council. In Shanghai there are mixed courts, consular courts, an American Superior Court, and Chinese courts. The Chinese are planning for the day when they will try all Chinese offenders. There is an imposing cathedral, and a modern Venetian style railway station. ”

“ All around the plain is intersected with deep drains, the muddy bottoms of which the sporting members of the Shanghai Hunt Club now and again make involuntary acquaintance. The position of Shanghai, situated as it is near the mouth of the Yangtze, marks it out as the future emporium of the commerce of Central China, through which must ebb and flow the ever-growing trade of nine of the eighteen provinces of the Middle Kingdom. The social intercourse between the foreign and the Chinese communities is very restricted, a restriction that cannot be laid entirely at the door of either side ”

“ The foreign concession is surrounded by streams and ditch from the rest, and is virtually an island isolated. The river bounds one side, and brooks the others; one crossed bridges and ditches, and finds change and decay! There is an Anglo-Chinese settlement, but all the foreign side is clean, well lighted by lamps and electricity, with fine houses, warehouses, and public buildings. Shanghai is no longer China in the settlements.
In the American settlement my friend Eagan, whom I suspected was an American bred, had indicated the hotel on the Broadway. ”

“ China has done this with whole nations, and, to the very end of time, whatever nation sets out to rule and conquer that new republic must make up its mind to be lost.
And so behind Shanghai is Chinese City, and behind that there is China, out upon the flat plains. There is another China yet beyond, and still another and as many as there are billows on the sea. Build modern buildings and cities, and the Chinese take them and turn them inside out, and they are what he wants them to be. This plastic people,—what is their destiny? ”

“ There have been famous consuls at Shanghai, like Sir Harry Parkes, whose statue is erected on the bund. He became British minister, and did much for British diplomacy and world trade in Chinese wars. The first government of the rebellion of October, 1911, opened in Shanghai, with Wu Ting Fang as foreign minister. Shanghai, like Tientsin and other river ports, has its great conservancy question in the matter of keeping the channel free from loess and sand silt. Dredging is infinitely too expensive, and the wit of man has to be matched against the will of tide and stream. ”

“ Though no other 'settlement' or 'concession' in China approaches Shanghai in importance, it would be easy to show that many others reproduce on a smaller scale results similar to those which British energy and the British aptitude for self-government have achieved in the 'Model Settlement.' I have dwelt at some length on this aspect of British interests in China because it is not easily realized by those who have not had an opportunity of seeing with their own eyes these robust offshoots of the British tree transplanted with all their indigenous vitality on to Chinese soil. ”

“ THE treaty of Nanking was concluded in 1842; but even before that time Shanghai was a place of considerable trading importance. By the treaty referred to, the port was thrown open to foreign trade, and its advantageous position led to so rapid an increase of its commerce, that it soon became the chief emporium of China. Shanghai city stands on the east of the province of Kiangsu, and on the verge of a vast productive plain, which, prior to the accession of the Chow dynasty, formed part of the old province of Yang-Chow, itself one of the nine provinces under the administration of the famous Yu. ”

“ At last Ssu-chuan aroused himself from his pleasures sufficiently to take alarm. He consulted his priests and seers, who assured him that heaven was angry because of the murder of Chwang-Keang. Never again, they said, would China know happiness or prosperity until the vanished moon returned, bringing the spirit of the dead empress to watch over the affairs of her beloved land. Upon her return, however, the glory of China would rise again, and the Son of Heaven would rule the world. ”

“ The insurrection—or the Taeping rebellion, as it is called—could have been easily put down in the beginning, but ministers in China are slow to move, and it soon became a real danger to the empire. The great object of the rebels was to gain possession of Shanghai, the centre of European trade, built in the midst of canals and rivers, with the great Yang-tse-kiang at hand to carry into the interior of China the goods of foreign merchants of all countries that come to its harbour across the Pacific. ”

“ If Shanghai is the sort of a place that it would here appear to be, if it sets a vicious example in its government, in its business practice, and in the character of many of its inhabitants, the fact would seem to indicate that it is most decidedly misrepresenting out there the sort of civilization that we, Europeans as well as Americans, have always supposed that we stood for. It would appear that the Chinese, at the point of contact with our civilization, are getting a false impression of us. ”

“ I trust that the moral influence of this great city will always be exerted in that direction. In addressing the merchants of Shanghai some three years ago, at the time when I announced to them that it was my intention to seek a treaty in Pekin itself if I could not get it before I arrived there, I made this observation—that when force and diplomacy should have effected in China all that they could legitimately accomplish, the work which we had to do in that empire would still be only in its commencement. ”

“ Shanghai exerts a direct and result-breeding influence on fifty to seventy-five million native minds, and an indirect influence on all China. How many scores of fair-minded, straightforward merchants, how many thousands of scattered missionaries and teachers will it take, think you, to counteract that influence?
China, grappling with the problem of decay, fighting desperately against an evil which the most nearly Christian of the Christian nations has fastened on her, looks westward for enlightenment, and sees—Shanghai. ”

“ It is certain that for many months yet the missionaries will not be able to return to their stations, and it will probably take many years, even with the marvellous recuperative powers the Chinese possess, before the province regains its normal conditions. For Szechuen is different from many provinces in China. The difficulties are different. The people—the tribal element, particularly—is a thorn in the flesh of Chinese officialdom, and at the present juncture in this volume to ponder upon this element in the national life will be probably of interest. ”